Assistant manager Joe Dunne says the message to the players is to ‘believe in yourselves, push and fight for each other,’ ahead of Saturday’s Sky Bet League Two clash at home to Stevenage.
The Boro visit One Call Stadium this weekend for a 3pm kick-off, with both sides looking to bounce back from defeats in the previous round of league fixtures.
The Stags’ assistant boss, Dunne, has urged the players to ‘bring out their quality to win the match.’
“We have to believe in ourselves and trust in what we do,” he began. “We have to trust in the players as well and trust their quality.
“That’s always been the message, from every member of staff, the gaffer [Graham Coughlan] especially leading us, go out and do what you’re good at.
“Go out and be competitive, work hard – we know we have all those attributes. If you keep working hard and keep believing in yourself, we’ll soon turn it so it will fall for us.
“[Our message to the players is to] go out, keep implementing the good stuff we’ve been doing.
“The gaffer will be detailed on the training ground again. Our message to the players on the training ground yesterday was to go out, believe in yourselves, push, fight for each other and bring out your quality to win the match.
“It’s the message that we repeat week-in, week-out. [If you do that] Saturday will take care of itself.”
The former Cambridge United manager also reflected on the Stags’ season so far.
“Of course we would prefer more points on the board, without stating the obvious,” he told iFollow Stags. “However, we do feel that points are available and we’ve shown that in previous games.
“We’ve got ourselves into the lead and in a position to get all three points, but unfortunately they have just got away from us.
“We need to keep focused and stick to fixing the things that have stopped us from getting more points, which for us as coaches, is our job to do.
“We feel the wins will come if we maintain our high performance levels. We always want more – we’ll always push for more.
“We’ve had lots of chunks in games where we’ve had good moments. We’ve been working really hard on the training pitch to create those moments.
“Performance levels – if they are high and you create chances in games – it will eventually turn for you.
“What we have done so far in the league, we feel that we can go up another notch, and the wins will come.”
Joe went onto discuss striker Danny Rose, who was sold to Sky Bet League One side Northampton Town last week.
“Danny [Rose] is obviously a club man and has been here for a period of time. He’s played, scored goals and had a good affinity with the crowd.
“But to anyone that understands the game, it doesn’t last forever. There will always be a time when you lose players and you gain players.
“Losing Danny was a disappointment for us – we offered him a contract in the situation to make him able to stay.
“But in this moment in time, with everything that is going on, players are always up there to be able to be transferred. The situation arose where he moved to Northampton.
“From a club point of view, it’s good business, from the player’s point of view, it’s up to League One.
“We initiated the hope of keeping him early in the pre-season, so we’re obviously disappointed to have lost him. But we move on quickly.”
Looking ahead to Saturday’s game, Joe confirmed that the Stags’ squad is ‘healthy’ ahead of a match against an ‘energetic’ Stevenage outfit.
“We’re in a good situation in terms of team selection. The squad is healthy enough. We’ve had one or two over the last few games where it’s been quite demanding [for them].
“Generally, we have a clean bill of health [for the Stevenage game].
“I would expect them [Stevenage] to come here and try to win a football match. But our focus is on us. We must go out with the intention of winning the match.
“Stevenage have a new manager with new ideas, who will want to impose his style.
“I’m sure we can expect an energetic team to come and play against us.”
iFollow Stags subscribers can watch Joe Dunne’s interview in full by logging into mansfieldtown.net/ifollow later today.
Match passes for Saturday’s match against Stevenage are now available to purchase for just £10. To get yours, click here.